Got a free server but I don't know how to play the game nor how to set up the server so I gave up after 10 minutes, never touched that server again...

And I think that is why probably MC is not that fast in gaining new subscribers, or may be I am just too old for those games :)

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Anyone running game server hosting that doesn't try to diversify their product offering is going to suffer. One game can only be that popular for so long. Minecraft may stand a lot longer than many, and it may have many more boosts in popularity before it drops, but it won't last forever.

Just like the current VPS boom. As the cost of dedicated resources decreases the LEB market will become too saturated and start to lose it's appeal at the same time. It will happen.

Apology for Terror: New free speech offense, used to silence people criticizing the governments for failing to address the real issues driving the radicalization (religious (christian-islamic), political (left-right), etc)

Good point. TF2 is still extremely popular today, despite being released around 5 years ago. Minecraft in comparison is only 3 years old.

@rds100 said: And the summer is over too in the northern hemisphere ;-)

Exactly! The Minecraft Forums are also seeing lower post volumes also since summer ended, Citricsquid said it's gone from (IIRC, I might be slightly off on the figures) 30k posts/day to 16k posts/day.

@NateN34 said: Highly doubt that the game is dying. It is only getting more popular as time goes on.

Yeah, the Minecraft hosting market is VERY over-saturated, with kid hosts everywhere. I think school is another reason why maybe kids aren't ordering servers as much.

School is a big factor, but overall popularity is declining. Still, it's the 9th best selling video game in the world, so it's not going to die quickly...

@Zen said: I disagree, they plan on monetizing MC2 by cutting out the hosts.

Mojang isn't even able to keep the login/session/skin/site servers up and running, I doubt they have the manpower, skills or interest to sell servers. A large part of Minecraft's success is the 300k+ servers, if you had to rent directly from Mojang, it would discourage a lot of people from running servers.

Here are some snippets from Minecraft server host reps / owners showing their frustration and views on the current state of the market. A lot of Minecraft hosts are disappearing and closing down now too. I also frequently speak to a lot of others who are feeling the exact same way. These people are not "kiddie" hosts and have legitimate companies that have been around for a while.

"The Minecraft industry is much harder than it was before, primarily due to the insanely low pricing everybody runs because they don't pay their employees nearly as much as we did. A couple companies made it big, but that's because they started before the market practically crashed."

I will offer you 1.5gb for $4.75 per month. To accomplish this I will stop paying taxes, close down the office and move the operation to my basement, sell my children and grossly oversell my product so I can make about a $0.25 per month profit.